


Drift Compatible

by fabrega



Series: SALTapalooza [6]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Pacific Rim Fusion, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-21
Updated: 2017-10-21
Packaged: 2019-01-20 19:19:16
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,767
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12439881
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fabrega/pseuds/fabrega
Summary: "I've seen the recruitment ads. 'Humanity's finest' join the jaeger program, and I'm not--you picked me up in a bar fight." McCree stares down at the floor, avoiding Gabe's eyes. "I ain't exactly humanity's finest."





	Drift Compatible

**Author's Note:**

  * For [smarshtastic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/smarshtastic/gifts).



> Week Five of SALTapalooza! Today's prompt was "AU of choice" and I just, I had to. This is a fourteen part series that will update every Saturday for the next nine weeks.
> 
> Feel free to come yell at [me](https://twitter.com/carithlee) or [smarshtastic](https://twitter.com/smarshtastic) about this on twitter. :D

"He laid out five of our top cadets," Marshal Morrison is saying as Gabe makes his way into Mission Control. Jack's hunched over one of the console screens, looking at it intently; from across the room, Gabe tries to guess what he could be looking at that was important enough for the Marshal to summon Gabe here at a moment's notice without telling him why.

When Gabe approaches, Jack tilts the screen so he can see it and restarts the video. It's security camera footage: Gabe recognizes the interior of the local bar, the one that's the favorite of the cadets and pilots from the base. Gabe hasn't been there in ages, not since he was a pilot himself. It doesn't seem like it's changed much, but he's pretty sure he's not watching this for the decor.

As they watch, a throng of people in PPDC jumpsuits approach the bar, where a guy in what looks like a cowboy hat is sitting, drinking alone. There's no sound on the surveillance footage, so it's not clear who says what to whom, but there's a confrontation, some shoving, and then an all-out brawl. The guy fights hard, a little desperately, a little dirty, and the PPDC kids are out of commission quickly. Gabe's actually impressed, although a quick look at Jack's face shows he's better off not saying so.

The footage ends when the guy steps over the knocked-out bodies of the PPDC kids, sits back down at the bar, and flags the bartender down for another drink.

Jack points at the bodies on the floor, naming each one in turn: Myers, Anderson, Janiszewski, Carles, Kora. Gabe lets out that low whistle now. He knows those names--the five of them have been in the top twenty in the candidate trials for the last month.

"The bar called the MPs," Jack says, glaring at Gabe. "The MPs picked him up and brought him back here. We're holding him under guard in one of the bunks downstairs, and local police are on their way to bring him in. He's been...uncooperative."

"It didn't look like he started it," Gabe says. He's not sure if that's true, but he starts the footage again anyway, watching the way the guy fights. It's dirty, but it's _good_.

"He laid out _five_ of our top cadets," Jack repeats.

Gabe folds his arms, still watching the screen out of the corner of his eye. "They have to fight kaiju, Jack, not assholes in a bar."

"The bar is Earth! The kaiju don't play nice or fair. If our pilots can't handle one asshole in a bar, how do they--" Jack stops. "You don't want to turn him in."

Gabe says nothing, looks up at Jack and then back down at the screen.

"I know that look, Gabe. That's the look you get when you have a plan that I'm not going to like. I really don't like that look." Jack sighs. "What are you thinking?"

Gabe reaches out to stop the footage. The guy is paused in the middle of an upper-cut, a moment before his fist connects with Kora's chin, and there's a look of pure terror on Kora's face. 

They both regard the screen, and Gabe grins. "If the kaiju aren't going to play nice, why should we?"

.

The bunk where they're holding the guy is easy to find--it's the only one with MPs stationed outside the door. When Gabe approaches, they throw him a salute, which he waves off.

"He's been, uh, difficult, sir," one of the MPs says carefully. It sounds a little like she had wanted to warn him against going in but then thought better of it. "We'll be out here if you need us."

Ominous, Gabe thinks, but okay. Gabe's unarmed, and the guy's unarmed, the MPs have surely made certain of that. What's the worst that could happen? He knocks on the door.

No answer.

He pushes it open gently and almost immediately finds out what, exactly, was the worst that could happen. The guy has somehow managed to disassemble the bunk's metal bed frame and comes running at Gabe wielding one of the frame legs like a club. Gabe dodges without thinking--right, then left--and when the guy swings the club at him again, Gabe lets it go past him, grabs the guy's arm, and uses the guy's momentum to turn him around and twist his arm up behind his back.

The guy drops the club and swears. "How the hell did you do that?"

That is a good question, one Gabe doesn't have an answer to. He's not going to say that, though, and so he leans harder into the guy's back and says, " _Magic_."

The guy snorts.

"I'm going to let you go now," Gabe tells the guy. "You're not going to do anything stupid, right?"

"Nah, I think I've gotten all the stupid out of my system, at least for now." The guy turns his head to look at Gabe over his shoulder; Gabe's suddenly aware of how close together their faces are.

Gabe lets go of the guy like he's been burned.

"They said the cops were coming, but you don't look like the cops." The guy turns to face Gabe, rotating his arm at the shoulder and wincing a little at the pull.

Gabe extends a hand. "Gabe Reyes. I'm Marshal Morrison's second-in-command."

The guy hesitates, then extends his own hand and shakes Gabe's. "Jesse McCree. Surprised they're sending the bigwigs down to deal with little ol' me."

Gabe smiles, steps back to lean against what's left of the bed frame. "You've caused the Marshal quite a headache. He was ready to turn you over to the police."

McCree snorts. "Lemme guess, you're here as the good cop, with an offer I can't refuse. You could use a man with my 'skills'--" here, he makes sarcastic air quotes, "--and it's either join up with you or you let Marshal What's-his-face turn me over to the cops."

"Got it in one. Been in this position before, have you?" Gabe asks, raising an eyebrow.

McCree flushes at this assessment, his hands clenching into fists for a moment before he obviously forces his whole body to relax. "What happens if I don't make it through this program of yours? I've seen the recruitment ads. 'Humanity's finest' join the jaeger program, and I'm not--you picked me up in a bar fight." He stares down at the floor, nudging with the toe of his boot at the piece of metal bed frame Gabe had made him drop earlier. "I ain't exactly humanity's finest."

"All we're asking is that you try. You try, actually _try_ , and you fail? You've still held up your end of the deal." Gabe steps forward again. The movement draws McCree's eye, and he looks up. "Between you and me, though, I think you've got a pretty good shot."

Jesse laughs unconvincingly. "Well, Reyes, if _you_ think so." His smirk is unconvincing too, but that doesn't stop Gabe from staring at it for a little too long.

.

Things get busy after that: a Category Two kaiju surfaces in the coastal coverage area of the LA Shatterdome, and Gabe's in charge while Marshal Morrison is off making nice with the UN while they try to decide how best to allocate jaeger program resources. What this means in practical terms is that Gabe mostly loses track of newly-minted PPDC recruit Jesse McCree. They cross paths once or twice in the mess, once or twice in the hallways, but never for very long and never more than casually. It seems likely that McCree will graduate from the program with a copilot and a jaeger waiting for him and then Gabe will probably never see him again--they're in need of pilots in Sydney, Tokyo, and Anchorage, not LA.

This ought to be fine, Gabe thinks, looking at his own face in the mirror at night. Why isn't it fine? Why does it feel like a personal loss?

One of these nights, unable to sleep, he takes a walk around the base. The Shatterdome never truly sleeps, but most people are safely tucked away and the hallways are quiet as Gabe paces through them.

He pauses outside the Kwoon. He can hear workout noises coming from inside, despite the late hour; intrigued, he pushes the heavy door further open to find McCree inside at one of the punching bags. He's sweaty, his hair tied back, his workout shirt clinging to the contours of his biceps, and Gabe's mouth has suddenly gone dry. He looks up as Gabe enters, obviously expecting to have the place to himself, but goes right back to it when he sees Gabe.

Gabe makes his way over, leans against the wall and allows himself to watch for a moment. McCree nods at him, offers him a terse _sir_.

"Think you need the extra practice, cadet?" Gabe asks him. His form is good; there's still an undercurrent of the rough-and-tumble that had gotten Gabe's attention in the first place, but he's obviously had more and better training and picked it up well.

McCree chuckles and steps away from the bag. "Is that an offer?" 

It hadn't been, but Gabe seriously considers it for a moment. 

When Gabe doesn't immediately answer, McCree continues, "I'm learning all the stuff the instructors teach us--Muay Thai, Krav Maga, boxing, all that--but I can't..." He trails off, waving his hands vaguely to describe something Gabe can't possibly guess. "I ain't figured out the whole 'drift' thing. They keep telling me it'll feel natural, that I'll _know_ , but it hasn't and I haven't, and I been kicked out of enough places for my--" he makes sarcastic air quotes, "--'inability to play well with others' to tell when it's coming on again."

Gabe steps forward, lessening the distance between them now that they're having a conversation. "I don't know what to tell you that you haven't already heard. You'll just know. _I_ just knew."

"Right, yeah, you're a jaeger pilot." 

Gabe blinks, a little surprised. He spends so much of his time wrapped up in PPDC bullshit that he tends to forget that people outside the program might know him from his jaeger days. "I mean, I used to be. Morrison and I piloted Shadow Helix, one of the late Mark 1s--after the radiation shielding, but before the neural dampeners got perfected. Three drops, three kills. We joined PPDC as soon as we could after the first kaiju hit San Francisco, and when they tested us for drift compatibility, we just knew."

McCree nods--Gabe wonders how much of that Jesse had already known, from the TV or wherever it was that he'd recognized Gabe as a pilot--and takes a frustrated punch at the bag. Gabe understands his frustration; drift compatibility had seemed foreign and unknowable to him too, until it had worked.

He continues, "And when it stopped, we just knew then too. It's why we're both desk jockeys now, not real pilots--as much as I want to get back out there, I can't anymore, not with Jack. That bridge got burned long ago."

"He sounds like an ex you're bitter about," McCree says, a little cautiously, and Gabe laughs.

"Sub in 'punching kaiju' for any hint of romance and you wouldn't be far off, I guess. Enough about me, though." And that is, that _really_ is enough about Gabe, that's more than he's told anybody beside the PPDC therapists about what's happened with him and Morrison, and he doesn't know how that happened. "You'll figure it out, I'm sure. How are you approaching your partner sparring? It's dialogue, not a fight. If you're concentrating on winning--"

"Can I show you?" McCree says.

That's how Gabe finds himself barefoot on one of the Kwoon mats, armed with nothing but his fists, facing off against McCree.

"Just realized I probably ought to be a lot more nervous about this than I am," McCree says as they circle each other, neither one making the first offensive move.

"You heard me, I'm out of practice. Too much time in meetings, not enough time in here." He grins at McCree. He's missed this. "If this was about you beating me, I'd be really worried."

"Yeah, but you're _important_ ," McCree says, grinning back. "Not sure what kind of trouble I'll get in if I kick the Marshal's second-in-command's ass in an unsanctioned fight in the middle of the night."

"Well then, I'll have to keep you from kicking my ass, then, won't I?"

Without warning, McCree lunges for him. 

They fight.

Well, that's not entirely true--like Gabe had said, it's not a fight. They dialogue. They _spar_. Gabe's not keeping score, and he's pretty sure McCree isn't either. They're fairly evenly matched, swinging at each other but never quite connecting, both good at subtly telegraphing their moves and anticipating where the other is going to be, so that each tackle or pin is countered quickly and efficiently. Gabe's heart is pumping, his blood is singing, he's _missed_ this. 

Eventually, though, McCree steps back and holds up a hand. He's breathing hard, even sweatier than before, and Gabe is _really_ doing his best not to stare.

To cover, Gabe asks, "So your partner compatibility sparring, it's like that? Because it seems to me like you're in great shape on that front."

McCree gestures vaguely again for a moment, then smiles at Gabe, a sudden, bright thing that makes Gabe's stomach jolt. "I do think I get it now. Thanks."

.

"I hear that your boy is causing trouble," Jack says to him over lunch a few weeks later. They're sitting in the mess hall at a table by themselves, everyone else too respectful or too afraid to even approach them.

"My--who?" Gabe is only mostly feigning confusion. He's got a pretty good idea of who Jack means, even as he bristles at both parts of the phrase "your boy". McCree's not a boy, and he's _certainly_ not Gabe's.

Jack fixes him with a look. "Amari says the instructors have been gossiping at the water cooler, says they can't believe McCree is as good as he is but can't find a drift-compatible partner."

"Wait, really? That doesn't--really?"

"Sounds like he's got a lot of baggage, makes drifting hard." When Gabe glares at him, Jack shrugs. "What? I'm just telling you what I heard--"

They both look up as someone nearby clears their throat. It's Cadet Kora, and he looks nervous. "Uh, sir? They need you in the Kwoon."

Jack grumbles under his breath about how he can't even make it all the way through a meal in peace and starts to stand.

"Uhhh," Kora says eloquently.

Jack stops, halfway out of his seat. "Spit it out, Cadet."

"Not you, sir." He points at Gabe. " _You_."

Gabe raises an eyebrow. "Me? What the hell?"

If it's possible, Kora looks even more uncomfortable. "It's--well, it's McCree."

Jack follows Gabe and Kora down to the Kwoon, and Gabe ignores Jack's waggling eyebrows as he tries to figure out what the hell McCree could've done in his training that would require Gabe's presence immediately. He'd made a note on McCree's file when McCree had enlisted: if there were any disciplinary problems, don't treat him any differently, but let Gabe know. He'd never heard anything, so he'd forgotten all about it, until now.

When they get there, Gabe takes in the scene. McCree is standing in the middle of the mat, looking angry, his arms folded. To one side, another cadet is sitting on the floor with a bloody or possibly broken nose, and two more are standing above her looking pretty beat up--at least one of them is going to have an impressive black eye tomorrow. An instructor stands between McCree and the other cadets, looking pissed off too.

Gabe looks to Jack, who shrugs unhelpfully. "They didn't ask for _me_."

"Him," McCree says, pointing at Gabe. "I want to try drifting with him."

The bottom drops out of Gabe's stomach. He folds his arms to cover his discomfort, but he realizes partway through the movement that McCree is doing the exact same thing, the two of them mirroring each other. He shoves his hands into his pockets quickly. "What _exactly_ is happening here?"

"Cadet McCree was sparring with Cadet Myers here." The instructor gestures at the woman on the floor with the bloody nose. "It's not combat and they both know that, but somehow McCree wound up elbowing Myers in the face. The others assumed it wasn't an accident, and, well." The instructor gestures again, this time at the other injured cadets, who look peeved.

"Was it an accident?" Gabe asks McCree.

McCree snaps back at him. "Of course it was an accident! What kind of asshole do you think I am?" His face turns surly, and he looks away. "Ain't ever felt drift-compatible with any of these guys. Just you."

In his peripheral vision, Gabe sees Jack's jaw drop open and then snap shut again.

"McCree." The instructor's voice is firm. As McCree glowers, the instructor addresses Gabe. "I told him that's not possible, and even if it was, it's not happening."

"I'm not crazy--you felt it, right?" McCree says to him, and Gabe doesn't know how honestly to respond.

.

Gabe paces.

He's in the conn-pod simulator, back in a drivesuit for the first time in ages. 

He shouldn't have agreed to this. Two days ago in the Kwoon, McCree had put forward a solution: he and Gabe would try to drift. If they couldn't, McCree would quit the program, wouldn't cause any of them any more trouble. The instructor had looked like the offer was a godsend. The other cadets had looked varying shades of disbelieving and relieved. Jack had looked dumbstruck, although Gabe didn't know if it was by McCree's audacity or the idea of Gabe in a jaeger again, and he hadn't really wanted to find out which.

Gabe had looked at McCree, and McCree had looked back at him.

He'd agreed.

He doesn't know if he's more afraid of the neural link failing or succeeding. There's a lot riding on this, and even though the fate of humanity has been at least partially on his shoulders for years now, this still feels huge, momentous, terrifying.

He paces.

He turns when the simulator AI announces a second pilot on board, and there's McCree. He's in a drivesuit too, holding his helmet, looking nervous. Gabe can't blame him.

"You done this before?" Gabe asks, gesturing with the helmet in his own hand at the simulator's harness.

McCree shakes his head. "Instructors always seemed to think it would be a waste of time for me to try. I know how it's supposed to work, though--I'll wind up inside your head, and you'll be inside of mine."

They both go quiet for a moment, pondering the implications of that. The silence hangs there for longer than Gabe's comfortable with, and he asks, "Anything you need to tell me, before I get in there?"

"Nothing you won't find out for yourself in a little bit here." McCree shrugs. "You know where you folks picked me up, you can probably take a guess at the kind of life I've led before joining the jaeger program." He pauses, grins lopsidedly. "Whatever you're thinking, it's probably more illegal than that--nothing that wound up on my permanent record, mind you, but... Just don't be surprised."

"What exactly am I supposed to be not surprised by?"

"What _I'm_ more interested in is what's going on in _your_ head," McCree continues, breezing past Gabe's question like he hadn't even heard it.

"You want to know what it's like to fight a kaiju?" Gabe manages to keep his voice steady even as McCree steps in closer to him.

"If this works, figure I'll find out soon enough. If it doesn't, well, no way I'll ever know, is there?" 

Gabe doesn't like the look McCree is giving him--or likes it too much, maybe that's the problem. 

"What I'm more interested in is--"

Before McCree can finish, the Marshal's voice comes over the intercom. "Gentlemen."

Gabe stifles a laugh at the almost automatic way McCree straightens up. Whether or not this works, the program has obviously done him _some_ good. Gabe walks over to the harness console and thumbs on the simulator's comms. "Can we help you, LOCCENT?"

Jack makes an exasperated noise. "You assholes want to get a move on? Some of us don't have all day."

"Yes _sir_ ," Gabe says, rolling his eyes at McCree, who huffs a laugh. "You can't hear it, LOCCENT, but I'm definitely saluting right now."

"I can see you, Reyes. The simulator's got cameras all over it." Jack says, his voice dry and just this side of amused. "Get yourselves strapped in and let's go." The intercom lets out a very definitive beep.

McCree looks at the harness rigs and then at Gabe. "You got a preference which side?"

Gabe pauses. In Shadow, with Jack, he'd always taken the left, hadn't been given much of a choice in the matter. If he wanted to make this easy, he'd just take the left again--but fighting kaiju has never been about _easy_.

"Why don't you take the left?" he says.

McCree shrugs, steps into the left harness and puts his helmet on, and Gabe does the same on the right. Jack's voice comes over the intercom again. "You two ready?"

McCree looks over at Gabe, reaches up this time for the comm this time and says, "Yeah, yeah I think we are," and then--

_Jesse's five years old and his dad's in the doorway and his mom looks so sad - Gabe's ten years old and at the hospital, his dad telling him he's got another little sister - Jesse's eight years old and looking around the warehouse nervously, his dad is talking to some people and had told Jesse to wait here, he lifts the lid on one of the crates and it's full of guns - Gabe's twelve and got into another fight at school, it's not his fault the bullies wouldn't leave Elisabeth alone, his mom puts ice on his eye and shakes her head - Jesse's thirteen and his dad's finally trusted him to stand lookout while the Deadlock weapons deal goes down, he knows they're all going to be in big trouble if anything goes wrong - Gabe's seventeen and trying to figure out what he wants to do after graduation, he's thinking about the army - Jesse's seventeen and SWAT raids the Deadlock hideout, he isn't proud but he runs, runs and doesn't look back - Gabe's twenty-two and in the army and getting ready to deploy to Afghanistan again - Jesse's nineteen and back in Santa Fe and drunk, and they're asking him to ID his dad's body - it's K-Day, the first kaiju swarming up out of the ocean, Jesse's watching on TV at the bar in Cabo, Gabe's halfway around the world and on Skype with his sisters - Gabe's in a jaeger for the first time, in Morrison's head and hell, they've both been worse places, after Afghanistan this is a piece of cake - (Jack Morrison is ten and still wants to grow up to be a superhero) - a call comes in on Jesse's phone from a number he really ought to have deleted, and the world is ending so Jesse picks it up and Cliff, from the Deadlock days, has a business proposition for him, is he still in the smuggling business - they're fighting their first kaiju, excitement and terror and assuredness in his gut in equal measure, Gabe punches it in its stupid, smug kaiju face until it goes down - Jesse watches as Cliff's people strip the kaiju down to its component parts, somebody somewhere is gonna pay big bucks for every inch of the thing just as soon as Jesse helps to get it to them, and Cliff nudges into Jesse with his hip and grins - it's his last mission with Jack, they're in the drift and Gabe sees, Gabe sees, and the jaeger staggers backwards, all out of alignment -_

\--Gabe feels himself go out of alignment, staggers backwards. In his peripheral vision, he sees Jesse slam backwards in the harness too. He shakes his head hard, he can _do this_ and he tells LOCCENT as much before he falls back into the drift--

_Jesse paces the room, hefting the piece of bed frame like a club, and the door swings open and fuck, Gabe sees himself through Jesse's eyes, slow-motion, backlit heroically, handsomely, in the light of the open door, and he feels Jesse's intake of breath and the way the fight feels more like a dance - Gabe walks into the Kwoon and jesus, he hadn't realized how long his gaze had lingered on Jesse's biceps or how much the sweat had glistened on Jesse's brow, and he can feel Jesse in the drift, pleased - they're both in their drivesuits in the simulator and god, the want is coming off of both of them in waves, how did Gabe not see -_

He hears the simulator AI: _calibration_ _complete_.

He hears Jack's voice on the intercom: _well shit, it actually worked._

The simulated jaeger slams its left fist into the palm of its right, mirroring Gabe and Jesse's movements in the simulator cockpit.

He hears Jesse's voice in his head: _Oh._

.

Afterwards, Marshal Morrison calls them both into his office. He stands behind his desk while Gabe and Jesse sit in front of it, trying not to look at each other. If Gabe felt it, Jesse has to have too.

"What exactly do you expect me to do now?" Jack asks. His voice is even, but Gabe knows Jack--his hands are hidden behind his back, undoubtedly clenched into white-knuckled fists, and that one vein is standing out on his temple. He makes his way around the desk to lean on the front of it. "This doesn't solve McCree's problem. Just because he can drift with you--you're not a pilot, Reyes."

Jesse's on his feet in an instant, his voice going low and angry. "Not anymore. Whose fault is that?"

Jack laughs mirthlessly. "I never even had this conversation with him, I'm sure as hell not having it with you--"

Jesse leaps at Jack and punches him right in the mouth. 

Gabe, only slightly too slow, is on them immediately, grabbing Jesse and pulling them apart. "Cadet!" he bellows, and he can almost feel how hard Jesse tries not to snap to attention.

Jack touches his fingers to his mouth, and they come away bloody. He takes a step towards Jesse, but Gabe moves between them.

"Think of that as the one I owed you," Gabe says, and Jack growls but doesn't argue. "Cadet, wait for me outside. You are _dismissed_."

Once the door closes behind Jesse, Gabe turns back to Jack. "I'll handle him. I'm sorry. But you're giving us a jaeger."

Jack works his jaw for a moment before responding. "You don't just _get_ a jaeger, Gabe. I can't just give you one. There's a whole class of cadets, and you're needed here on the ground."

"The reason I stayed on, when you took the promotion, is because you and me? Our bullshit?" Gabe gestures between them, "It was less important than the fate of the world. This is fate of the world stuff, Jack, and if we deserve to be out there on the front lines and you won't let us..."

Jack snorts, swiping the blood from his mouth with the back of his hand. "Don't pretend this is all high and mighty of you. You've wanted back in a jaeger for years."

"Is that a risk you want to take? Besides, I've been in this program as long as you have, and I've got plenty of favors I can call in--they need jaegers and pilots in at least three other 'domes. I'm sure somebody would be happy to have us."

Jack says nothing, but then again, Gabe's not sure what he expected.

"The techs said our connection was stronger than anything they'd seen. At least let us keep running sims. Maybe our scores will make the decision for you," Gabe tries again, and Jack finally, begrudgingly, nods.

Jesse is outside Jack's office when Gabe leaves, right where Gabe told him to be. He lights up at the sight of Gabe, and it's all Gabe can do to keep from smiling back. 

"We need to talk," he tells Jesse.

"What, here?"

"No, not here." Gabe's large quarters have been doubling as his office while the LA Shatterdome experiences some growing pains, so he leads Jesse back to his office which just so _happens_ to also be his room. Jesse smirks at him as Gabe keys into the door, but the smirk evaporates when Gabe puts distance between them once they're inside. Gabe leans up against the wall by his bed, while Jesse hovers near Gabe's desk.

"What the hell were you thinking?" Gabe finally lets himself be angry, lets himself raise his voice, lets the thunder come into his eyes. "You don't punch the Marshal! Especially not when you want something from him!"

Jesse starts to respond, but Gabe cuts him off.

"I know what you think you saw--"

"I know what I _saw_ ," Jesse says, chin raised defiantly.

"--but you've _got_ to be smarter than this. I know you are. I've been in your head."

"Can we talk about that--?"

"Do you understand how important this is? If you do something like that again, we'll both be out on our asses."

"I don't want to lose this," Jesse says quietly. "I'll do whatever I need to. I promise."

Gabe studies his face for a long moment before nodding. "Morrison's promised us more time in the simulator together. We just have to make sure our scores are good enough."

"I felt like I could punch about fifteen kaijus today, so I ain't seeing how they won't be good enough." He grins and moves to stand by Gabe. "Now, are we gonna talk about this thing, or do I have to just kiss you?"

"What do you want to talk about?" Gabe asks, and Jesse closes the distance between them and kisses him.

.

It's two months before the Marshal finally gives in, two months before Gabe is finally back in a real jaeger. He and Jesse spend a good chunk of those two months in the simulators, ending with a near-perfect record: forty drops and thirty-seven kills, and of the three they'd missed, two were multi-jaeger drops where another team took down the kaiju and the last one _should_ have been a multi-jaeger drop. The time they don't spend in the simulator, they spend in the Kwoon, sparring, or in bed, learning and relearning every inch of each other. There are times when it's easy to forget that the world is ending just outside their door.

The jaeger is brand new, Mark 3, sleeker and more powerful than Gabe's previous jaeger had ever been. It's got elbow rockets and a nuclear core and one of the new plasma cannons that PPDC R&D have been working so hard on for the last year. 

Gabe's in love.

"It's beautiful," Jesse breathes, looking up, up, up at the jaeger--at _their_ jaeger.

"She's got a name," Gabe says, knocking their shoulders together but not taking his eyes off of the jaeger. "Deadeye Hellfire."

"A beautiful name for a beautiful thing."

"Thank you," Gabe says quietly, leaning into Jesse a little more.

"No, see, the _jaeger_ is the beautiful thing--"

Gabe snorts, looks over at Jesse now, who casts a sidelong glance at him and grins. "I'm serious. Thank you, Jesse. That I even get to _think about_ setting foot in a jaeger again--that's something you did. I owe you so much for that."

"Hey, I wouldn't be here without you either, a couple of different ways. Didn't think I had to say it. Thought you already knew." Jesse pauses, looks at Gabe. "How 'bout we call it even, go punch some monsters?"

They suit up.

Deadeye's conn-pod is a step up from the simulator they've spent so much time in, which itself was five steps up from what Gabe had been used to.

"We can definitely do this, right?" Jesse asks, shifting as much as he can while they're strapping him in. They're not hooked up yet, but Gabe doesn't have to be to feel the nervousness radiating from Jesse.

"We've done this in the simulator, more than forty times," Gabe says, trying to ignore the butterflies in his own stomach.

"Yeah, but we weren't ever actually hooked up to a giant robot before." 

Morrison's voice comes over the intercom. "Godspeed, Deadeye. Don't fuck this up."

"Thanks for your support, LOCCENT," Gabe says, and then

the dr _ift--_

_Gabe's looking down at Jesse, his head thrown back against the pillow, his breath soft and panting, and he feels it, his hand on Jesse's cock, but he can feel it from Jesse's side too, Gabe's hand on his cock, the arousal coiling in his gut, the way it's building, building, building - Jesse keeps his head down in the hallway, the other cadets are finding out today which of them get to be rangers and which of them won't, four pairs of pilots headed to three other Shatterdomes out of a class of a hundred, and then there's them - Gabe gets his mom on a video call, tells her he's going to be a jaeger pilot again, doesn't miss the way she bites her lip for half a second before managing to look thrilled for him - Jesse nudges Gabe awake and Gabe can see himself asleep and see Jesse when his eyes flutter open and Jesse opens his mouth to say something, something important -_

Deadeye's AI announces: _calibration complete_.

Gabe raises his right arm, and so does Jesse, and so does the jaeger. He feels Jesse grin.

The helicopters take them out to the ten-mile mark. They're meeting up with another jaeger, Shrike Protector, piloted by the Amaris, a mother-daughter team; Gabe's ridden with the elder Amari, Ana, back in the early days of the program.

They walk the perimeter of LA's Miracle Mile. If a kaiju breaks through there, it'll be a miracle if it doesn't make landfall, so it's their job, when the time comes, to make sure it never does. Shrike and the other two jaegers stationed here have held the Miracle Mile six times now, keeping LA and the whole of the western US coastline safe. Gabe can feel Jesse's excitement in the drift, knows that Jesse can feel his too.

At the end of their patrol, Ana Amari's voice comes over the comms. "Welcome to the team, boys. Jesse, it's good to have you. Gabriel, it's good to have you back."

"Thank you, ma'am," Jesse says, the grin on his face evident in his voice.

"It's good to be back," Gabe says, and he really, really means it.

.

It's 3am when the next kaiju shows up, Gabe and Jesse both sound asleep in the bed they share when the call comes in. They're up at a moment's notice, Jesse excited but still grumbling sleepily, Gabe wide awake and wishing that he wasn't. The kaiju is a Category Three, codename Talon, and Deadeye is being deployed to take care of it, with Shrike on standby if they need help. They've taken down kaiju up to Category Four in the simulator, so it shouldn't be a problem, but Gabe knows that things are different in the field, can go sideways really quickly if they're not careful.

It's dangerous business, what they're headed out to do, and even though the clock is ticking down to when Talon makes landfall, Gabe still takes the time to pull Jesse aside and kiss him. He doesn't need to say it--that's the thing about the drift, there's so many things they don't need to say. Still, even though he knows that Jesse knows, he murmurs it against his lips anyway: _I love you_.

Jesse looks at him seriously. "It's going to be okay."

Gabe nods, closing his eyes, letting his forehead rest against Jesse's. "I know. Doesn't make it any less true."

And Jesse nods back, says: _I love you too._

They suit up quick when they finally make it there. Winston in the control room comes over the comms and tells them _it's good of you to join us_ , and they all laugh, like this is some kind of good joke and not a matter of life and death for the West Coast. LOCCENT has plotted them an intercept path, and they'll be briefed on the way. They're hooked into Deadeye and the neural bridge is established

_"He'll find out," Jack says, and the man in the suit shrugs and says that's Jack's problem, not his -_

Winston's voice cuts through the memory. "Deadeye, you're out of alignment. Are you okay?"

Jesse is quiet for a long moment, longer than he should be, staring straight ahead, but then he looks over at Gabe. " _Are_ we okay? Gabe?"

Gabe shakes his head to clear it, takes a deep breath. He's okay. They're okay. Winston tells them that the alignment has evened out, and Jesse tells him that they're okay.

It's a relatively short walk, out to the place they're supposed to intercept Talon, and they're there before they know it. It's stormy, because of course it is, stormy and dark, and they're unable to get a visual on the monster for several long moments--and then it bursts out of the water and goes for Deadeye's throat. It's an ugly sonofabitch, with sharp claws and even sharper teeth, and it's only Jesse's bar-brawler reflexes that keep it from eviscerating them. Deadeye catches it mid-leap with a swift upper-cut, and it falls back, dazed. Jesse lets out a joyous noise, and Gabe can't help but grin.

The fight is pretty decisive. If Talon was expecting a fight, it wasn't with a jaeger that fights like Deadeye does, quick and unconventional and mean. Between Jesse's skill, the tactical prowess Gabe had earned over years at the PPDC, and Deadeye's brand new plasma cannon, the kaiju didn't stand a chance.

LOCCENT tells them that the containment crews are on their way, and they stand for a moment, delighted in their victory. If Jesse wasn't all the way over there, Gabe could kiss him. As it is, the drift will have to do.

When they get back to the Shatterdome, there's not much of a celebration; they were given a job to do, and it's unremarkable that they did it. They're greeted by a fleet of jaeger techs and unhooked from Deadeye, the silence in their heads suddenly deafening. On the way to their debrief, they're met by the pilots from Shrike, Fareeha greeting Jesse with a complicated handshake and a jubilant hug, Ana nodding at Gabe and smiling. The four of them debrief, a relatively quick and easy affair, and then they are turned loose.

Fareeha pulls Jesse aside and asks him if he wants to go out to celebrate. It's early, but the city has just avoided another kaiju attack and there will undoubtedly be people out who will buy them a drink or two, even at this hour, people who will be happy to shake their hands or ask them to dance, women who Jesse can talk Fareeha up to--she _is_ a rockstar jaeger pilot, after all.

Jesse doesn't answer right away, looks at Fareeha, then looks at Gabe.

Gabe couldn't blame him, wouldn't stop him, if he wanted to go. He'd gone, the first time Shadow had taken down a kaiju.

Ana makes a soft _tsk_ noise. "Fareeha! Do you remember our first kaiju? I'm sure the two of them have much they need to talk about."

"They _drifted_ , Mum, what could they possibly need to--" Fareeha clams up when she sees the look Ana is giving her.

"I'll owe you that drink," Jesse says, elbowing Fareeha. "A round on me next time, okay?"

Fareeha nods while Gabe gives Ana a thankful look, and then Gabe and Jesse are alone.

"Should we--" Gabe starts to ask. Jesse nods before he can finish, and they make their way to their quarters.

Gabe's not sure what he's expecting, when they get there. He knows they're both tired and sore, because piloting a giant robot with your mind and your body is hard goddamn work, and there's part of him that wants to just collapse into their bed exhausted, maybe trade backrubs, maybe nap for a while. There's also part of him that wants to fall into bed in an entirely different way, wants to strip Jesse out of his clothes and pin him to the bed, make him feel even better than they both already do, celebrating the best way Gabe knows how.

He also knows they should talk. His memories nearly caused them to fail their mission before it even started, and while he didn't feel any judgement from Jesse in the drift in the moment, they need to--talk. Gabe needs to reassure them both that it won't happen again.

Inside their quarters, Jesse closes the door and locks it behind them. Gabe lets him make the first move, which turns out to be sitting on the edge of the bed and removing his boots before flopping backwards onto the bed. After a moment, Gabe joins him, both of them staring at the concrete ceiling, not speaking. It's peaceful, a strange contrast from the frenzy of the rest of the day, and Gabe lets his eyes flutter closed without even meaning to.

Jesse's voice startles him back into the moment. "Do you know why I was in that bar, where you guys found me? Is that something you've seen, in my head?"

Gabe gets a flash, muted, faraway, of the kaiju dealer, Cliff, and the cloud of emotions surrounding him: pride, happiness, regret. They're not _his_ memories, and he goes still for a moment at the realization that they might be ghost-drifting. He looks over at Jesse, who's still staring at the ceiling. He reaches out with his own mind for Jesse, puts his memory of watching the security camera footage of Jesse's fight in the forefront of his mind. Jesse's eyes go wide and he turns his head to look at Gabe too.

"Are we--?" Jesse says aloud, although he doesn't really need to.

Gabe nods.

"Okay, no, we're doing this now anyway. It needs to be done. You may not have seen why I was in that bar, because I try not to think about it, and when it does come up, you tend to be a little... preoccupied. The reason I was there is because of a deal, a deal like the one you gave me. You know I was running kaiju parts for Cliff, right? And that that's real illegal?"

Gabe nods again.

"Well, things were good, and I got cocky. On one late night through Texas, I got sloppy, got pulled over for speeding. They checked the truck, and I was in some deep shit. They gave me a deal like you did: go to prison, or go back to Cliff wearing a wire and help the feds take down the whole operation. Lotta the guys from my dad's gang ended up in prison. No matter how much I liked Cliff, I sure as hell didn't want to go to prison." 

Jesse looks away from Gabe and back at the ceiling. Even through their fuzzy connection, the distress Jesse is feeling is almost palpable. Gabe rolls up on his side and pulls Jesse close to him, presses a kiss to his neck. Jesse still doesn't look at him, but the feeling in Gabe's head goes quieter.

"The feds took Cliff in and cut me loose, and I got drunk for...about a year? It ain't easy to keep track of time when you're in that state. Came out the other side a little worse for the wear and bounced around for a bit until I ended up in what I swear I didn't know was the Pan Pacific Defense Corps' favorite bar." Jesse's jaw works for a moment, and Gabe kisses that too. "Cliff yelled a lot of bullshit at me as they dragged him out, but a lot of it was about how I'd betrayed him. When you chase the RABIT with the Marshal, that's where I end up, the day the feds raided the warehouse, the look on his face. It's not just you with alignment problems."

"I didn't mean for you to have to relive that," Gabe says quietly.

Jesse shrugs. "You know how it is. It's a thing that's on your mind."

They fall silent--each thinking, Gabe can tell, about betrayals.

"You get put in a bad position and you make the best of it. You do what you have to do. That's what the whole goddamn jaeger program is, humanity doing what it has to do." Gabe props himself up on an elbow so he can look at Jesse straight-on. "What I realized today is that I'm not afraid. We punched out a twenty-five hundred ton giant monster, just you and me, and--"

"--I feel like I'm never going to be afraid of anything again," Jesse finishes for him. He looks at Gabe. "We'll be okay?"

Gabe pauses, then nods. "Yeah, I think we will." 

Jesse smiles at Gabe, then surges up and kisses him.

They celebrate the best way Gabe knows how. When he presses his hands to Jesse's chest, pinning him to the bed, he feels it in his own head too; when he licks just _here_ and twists just like _that_ , the feedback he gets is so visceral that he nearly comes too, untouched. 

"Yeah, yeah, Gabe, right there," Jesse bites out.

And Gabe grips him harder and says, "Yeah, I know, _god_ , I know."

It doesn't take long after that, Jesse coming undone below him, Jesse's voice in his head calling his name. Gabe finishes, shuddering, and he collapses onto Jesse and then down onto the bed. The feeling in his head is bright and peaceful, and feels like a sunrise. It's the start of a new day, and they're going to face it together, in a giant robot.

**Author's Note:**

> I need you all to know that the working name for the Amaris' jaeger was "Shriker Eureka". That's all.


End file.
